Video: Understanding the Edit modes

The Edit modes shuffle, slip, spot, and grid determine how regions behave when edited by the Edit tools. Let's check slip first while using the Grabber tool. In Slip mode, when you click and move a region, the regions move freely. You can leave empty spaces, or they can overlap each other. When you trim them, it's the same deal. Also, note that when we move a region, the automation follows.

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Understanding the Edit modes

The Edit modes shuffle, slip, spot, and grid determine how regions behave whenedited by the Edit tools.Let's check slip first while using the Grabber tool.In Slip mode, when you click and move a region, the regions move freely.You can leave empty spaces, or they can overlap each other.When you trim them, it's the same deal.Also, note that when we move a region, the automation follows.

Now let's go to the Shuffle mode, and we'll stay with the Grabber tool.Shuffle mode restricts placement of the regions, so that they snap to each other end-to-end.If I click and drag this, you'll see the yellow line. That means that these tworegions are going to bud up against each other.Right there I just flipped these two, rearranging them, and I can put thatregion in between those two.If I use the Trimmer tool, you'll see how when I trim this, all of these regionsback here move forward.

Now let's try the Spot mode.I will go back to the Grabber tool.As soon as I click on a region with the grabber, the Spot dialog opens.In this window, we can tell Pro Tools where we want the region to be moved to, inBars and Beats, Minutes and Seconds, or any of these other options.You can type it in exactly;we can say 25. Or we can use the original timestamp, and that's the location wherethis region was originally recorded.I am going to cancel out of here. And if I use the trimmer, the same happens:the Spot dialog opens, and you can choose specifically where you want to trim the region.

Let's move on to the Grid mode.I will go back to the Grabber tool.When you're in Grid mode, your edits and selections are constrained to thegrid, and it's based on the time scale and the grid size.So we're in Bars and Beats right now, and we're looking at a grid value of a quarter note.So that's the grid size.So if I go down here and move this, it's going to move in increments of a quarter note.You can see that reflected up here.

If I switch to the Selector tool, all of my selections are constrained to the grid.The same goes to the Trimmer tool.When I trim, all of the trimming is done right to the grid.Now you can see the gridlines in here, and that's because this button is illuminated.If I click this, it will hide the gridlines.You can do the same by clicking on the time scale.There are two types of grid modes:there is the Absolute grid and the Relative grid.Absolute grid snaps region starts to the nearest gridline, and that's what Iwas just showing you.

Relative Grid is a little bit different.The regions move in increments of the grid value, but the region start pointsdon't have to be on the grid.It'll still move in increments of the grid.Let me show you an example.First, I'm going to zoom in here, and you'll see that this region is locked to the grid.Temporarily, I'm going to go to Slip mode and use the trimmer to trim this sothat it's not on the grid.Now I'm going to go back to Relative grid, and with the grabber, I'm going toslide this, and watch what the motion does here.

It's moving in increments of the grid.However, it's not locked to the beginning points of the grid.So we are moving this in quarter-note increments right now.There are some easy shortcuts that apply to the Edit modes.You can use F1 for shuffle, F2 for slip, F3 for spot, and F4 for grid.You can toggle F4 between absolute and relative.Now if you're in Grid mode and you want to temporarily suspend the Grid mode toswitch over to slip while you're dragging a region, all you need to do is pressthe Command key on a Mac or the Ctrl key on Windows, and you won't beconstrained to the grid as you drag the region. Watch this.

There is another key command that I like a lot, and it's called the shuffle lock.This mode disables all key commands and control surface switches for Shuffle mode.Thus, it prevents you from entering Shuffle mode ever.I think it's handy, because sometimes Shuffle mode can really mess with yourtiming, if you end up trimming or moving regions round in Shuffle mode, andyou're not aware that you're actually in Shuffle mode.So to turn on shuffle lock, go up to the Shuffle button and Command+Click it on aMac or Ctrl+Click it on a Windows machine.

You'll see that this little lock icon shows up.That means that shuffle lock is active.So there you have it--the power of the Edit modes.Understanding the Edit modes is extremely important when learning how to edit in Pro Tools.I recommend spending some time working with them, and follow the examples herein this video several times to really grasp their different powers.

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